Pre-releases of the Artful Aardvark are *not* encouraged for anyone needing a stable system or anyone who is not comfortable running into occasional, even frequent breakage. They are, however, recommended for Ubuntu flavor developers and those who want to help in testing, reporting, and fixing bugs as we work towards getting this release ready.

Beta 1 includes a number of software updates that are ready for wider testing. This is still an early set of images, so you should expect some bugs.

While these Beta 1 images have been tested and work, except as noted in the release notes, Ubuntu developers are continuing to improve the Artful Aardvark. In particular, once newer daily images are available, system installation bugs identified in the Beta 1 installer should be verified against the current daily image before being reported in Launchpad. Using an obsolete image to re-report bugs that have already been fixed wastes your time and the time of developers who are busy trying to make 17.10 the best Ubuntu release yet. Always ensure your system is up to date before reporting bugs.

Kubuntu

Kubuntu is the KDE based flavor of Ubuntu. It uses the Plasma desktop and includes a wide selection of tools from the KDE project.

If you’re interested in following the changes as we further develop the Artful Aardvark, we suggest that you subscribe to the ubuntu-devel-announce list. This is a low-traffic list (a few posts a month or less) carrying announcements of approved specifications, policy changes, alpha releases, and other interesting events.